The two slowly evolving minimalist tracks, both exactly 20 minutes long, were completed over Christmas 2019 just prior to the new decade 2020.

As the album title Drone Alone suggests, all elements were created in isolation.

This includes all writing, instrumentation, recording and production of the album’s music by Dave Lancaster. The 40 minute album was finalised on Christmas Day in his home studio in the Colne Valley in the English county of West Yorkshire.

Lancaster was also responsible for the cover photography (shot in Isafjordur, Iceland) as well as the design concept and layout.

Of the album’s conception, Lancaster states: “After far too much dreaming, too many excuses and with an end of a decade fast approaching, I decided that 2019 would be the year that I would finish my first album for wide release.”

While Drone Alone in its finished form is two sets of 20 minute soundscapes, it started its life as much shorter pieces. Of the music’s evolution, Lancaster stated: “I liked the idea that a piece of music could evolve organically and go on breathing like a tide coming back and forth.”

The album’s two tracks combine layers of processed keyboards and software instruments while avoiding drums and vocals to create an ocean of sound for the listener to explore themselves.

“My favourite ambient tracks wash over me and are almost hypnotic, occupying a strange place whereby it can function as both background and foreground music.”

The first track To Sleep Through Dreams is a contemplative piece that begins with foreboding Blade Runner-esque synth before decaying into darker territory.

The album’s closer Decades uses an underlying rotary speaker throughout to create a swirling, hypnotic soundscape for the listener to lose themselves in. For Lancaster, the track is one of reflection as years and decades roll back and forth in memory and anticipation.

Lancaster is already working on a follow up solo album but his “dream would be to combine my love of film and music and become a composer for the screen but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”